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The episodic tale of Azrael, immortal Angel of Death and Savior of Bastion.

Last Time…

Episode Summaries

Episode I – The Gallows Beam

Part One – “Gold” – Azrael is a resident crime fighter in Bastion, embarking on nightly missions to fight the criminal element and keep his city safe. He returns home one evening to his wife, Iris, after searching for a member of a local gang called the Glass named “Blades” Alvarez. After hanging up his hood for the night and going to bed, he receives an early morning phone call from Iris’s sister, Raziel, who’s seen a vision of Alvarez’s location. When Azrael arrives at the location, he discovers Alvarez’s corpse, hung by the neck from a tree in front of an abandoned courthouse.

Part Two – “Blood” – After talking out the possibilities, Azrael and Iris return to the scene where Azrael had discovered Alvarez’s body to find a group of gangsters in sack cloth masks have constructed a wall around the square. The two fight and subsequently interrogate the group, one of the criminals revealing that the crime was perpetrated by a killer known as the Hangman. Azrael returns that evening after doing some research on the subject to find the Gallows’ fortress waiting for him with an open gate. He steps inside to see the Hangman has taken more victims and enlisted new gangsters as underlings, and after a long talk with the serial killer, the Hangman reveals to Azrael that his agents will murder one hundred innocent people should anyone try to stop him before he’s crossed all the targets off his list. Azrael returns home to Iris and explains the situation before revealing his secret weapon: He knows the Hangman’s true identity.

Part Three – “Flame” – Azrael approaches the Gallows again seeking a conference with the Hangman, claiming that he has an offer for the killer. During their discussion, Azrael reveals the Hangman to be former prosecutor Harvey Adams, whose best friend was killed by a member of the Glass, and whose trial was bought off. Azrael offers to get legal justice for everyone involved in the trial if the Hangman surrenders himself, but the Hangman refuses, forcing the two to go to war. Azrael and Iris discover that the Hangman’s hundred were secretly just a contingency plan to make sure everyone on his list of victims dies if he’s stopped, and after careful planning, Azrael and Iris raid the Gallows, now bigger and more ferocious than ever before. Azrael saves the life of a black-haired woman from the Hangman’s clutches and stops the killer, bringing down the Gallows for good.

Episode II – Blood From a Stone

Part One – “The Taller They Are” – A pair of highly skilled operatives kill a security team to steal a transport truck from a museum, knocking a crate from the truck in the process. When investigating the case undercover disguised as a detective, Azrael discovers the crate contained an ancient Aztec idol statue, a secretly supernatural object he shared an extensive history with. Azrael searches the city desperately to find the idol, eventually discovering himself in the brick cistern of a decommissioned sewer unit. Here he discovers the power in the idol, an ancient terror he calls Temple, has begun collecting bricks to increase the size and power of his form. Temple takes the form of an eight-foot brick titan, and after a long a hard-fought battle, Temple leaves Azrael bleeding at the bottom of the chamber, swearing to destroy everything and everyone he loves. Azrael collapses in the foyer of his house, his vision fading to black as his daughter beholds her dying father.

Part Two – “The Harder They Fall” – Azrael regains consciousness with a broken leg, arm, and ribs. Iris enlists the help of her sister Raziel to bring Azrael back to health, and after repairing his wounds, Azrael brings in his good friend Michael to help stop Temple. The four lay plans to bring the titan down, and meet outside of an outlet from the sewer system where Temple hides, blowing up the tunnels and forcing him into a safe area where they can do battle with him. Michael and Raziel keep the now stories-tall Temple distracted as Azrael and Iris break into his body. After avoiding the various traps and dangers within, they reach his heart, shattering the titan and placing him back into proper containment.

Episode III – A New World Order

Part One – “Contusions” – Azrael comes home after a long night of fighting with a new set of scars, and after a brief intimate moment with Iris, the two are interrupted by a phone call from Raziel about a robbery in the local area. Azrael begrudgingly leaves Iris to investigate it, and discovers an almost miraculous sight as the vault has been stripped away and completely removed from the bank. Azrael gives up on the lead and returns home. The following night he finds himself guarding a woman’s apartment as a personal favor, and after it’s attacked by a former boyfriend, Azrael discovers the man has the ability to disassemble objects and rebuild them as weapons. After weakening the man, the fight leads the two into a nearby apartment complex, and Azrael is pushed into the bottom of the elevator shaft as the cabin flies toward the floor.

Part Two – “The Lives We’ve Chosen” – With an intense amount of effort and a nominal amount of profanity, Azrael escapes the elevator shaft and returns home to nurse his injuries. Iris expresses her concern about Azrael fighting a war by himself and coming home injured every night. The two interview the woman that the mystery man attacked, and subsequently investigate his apartment, believing he may be possessed. Their investigation reveals him as Jackson Garmana, a recently laid off employee of Kingston Steel, and that he may be targeting an executive on a plane leaving that night. When Jackson arrives at the airport, Azrael and Iris engage him, and Azrael calls the presence inside him to come out. The demon reveals itself to be Droigheann, a mind-reading, darkness-wielding chaos demon who claims to know Azrael’s secrets. Droigheann implies that Azrael is angry with Iris, and after the fight that ensues, she escapes with Jackson. Azrael and Iris discuss their recent issues, and just as they discover a resolution, a nearby airplane has its engines disassembled in midair, forcing the two into action.

Part Three – “Heart of Darkness” – Azrael and Iris save the plane by landing it on a nearby highway, deciding it’s imperative that Droigheann be stopped. After looking more extensively through a datebook found in Jackson’s apartment, they’re led to a construction site where they share an inflammatory conversation with Droigheann before the fight begins. Droigheann uses Jackson to create an enormous metal scorpion using parts of old construction machines and packing powerful destructive force. After a hard fight, Azrael knocks Jackson unconscious, forcing Droigheann out. The two exchange words before an intense battle, and Azrael uses the Heart of Darkness to bring Droigheann to a stop, cutting a deep scar across the eye on her chest. He considers killing her, but decides to let her leave, telling her that if he ever sees her again he will lack the same mercy. Finally, he and Iris return home having reconciled their issues and finally sharing some time to themselves. A week later, an officer at a local prison discovers Jackson hung in his cell with no killer to be found.

Episode IV – The Fear of Death

Part One – “The Mark” – A woman named Marsha is closing a local high-end department store when she’s violently robbed by a group of masked criminals. After Iris mentions the case to Azrael, the two move to investigate the group of career criminals, and Az decides to visit Marsha in the hospital. He reveals to her that he’s an angel by healing her wounded eye and tells her that he’s one of the good guys. She gives him the information he needs, and on his way out of the hospital he meets Aaron Slate, Captain of the Bastion Police. He returns home where first learns of David Fadi, Bastion Mayoral Candidate and Head of Technological Development at local tech giant Albright Industries. Azrael fruitlessly attempts to track the guns used in the robbery, eventually finding his culprits during their attempt to steal a project from a Cloud, a local tech firm. He’s surprised to find one of them has an exoskeleton arm modification that makes him an especially tough fighter, and Azrael is brought to his knees with a gun to his by the end of the conflict.

Part Two – “The Mind” – A blue streak of light tears through the room, incapacitating all the assailants before coming to help Azrael up. Gabriel has arrived, and the two take a prisoner from the thugs in the room to interrogate, letting the others escape. They head back to the Valentine house, where Azrael discovers Raziel has been waiting for him to discuss some of his recent issues with Droigheann, and she reveals that she knows the some of the secrets Azrael’s been keeping from everyone. Azrael reveals his insecurity, that he doesn’t believe he’s a good person like the rest of the Archangels. Raziel tries to convince him otherwise, and encourages him to start letting people in on his secrets. Gabriel reveals that the man he interrogated was hired by a person called “Armor” and has another upcoming job at a local security company, and Azrael visits the flower shop his mother owns to have a few words.

Part Three – “The Master” – Azrael and Iris discuss his conversation with Raziel, and Azrael reveals that ever since he returned to Bastion, he’s had a recurring dream about beating his father to death with a bat in a dark alley. He discusses his feelings about how he doesn’t believe he’s good, and how inherently violent he considers himself. Iris reassures him, understanding the concept of having a hard time loving who you are, and tells Azrael that even if he doesn’t believe he’s good, his actions speak volumes about him. Az, Iris, Gabriel, and Raziel work on stopping the vans inbound to the security company and recover the stolen prototype, but discover their intel was false, and are forced to chase a set of escaping security vans. After upsetting the van in the street, Azrael comes face-to-face with the woman who hired them who he’d mistakenly called Armor, a dangerous and powerful yet oddly flirtatious fighter named Amour. She mysteriously disappears, and after a cryptic goodbye with Gabriel, Azrael begins to research Amour, when he and Iris suddenly see a chilling newspaper headline about a man named Lazarus Wolfe.

Episode V – Do Not Resuscitate

Part One – “Statement of Intent” – Azrael and Iris search desperately for Lazarus Wolfe, beginning with a formal introduction to Captain Slate. Azrael discovers that the thieves from the Pharaoh Logistics heists were hanged in their cells like Jackson Garmana, and wonders if there’s any connection. He warns Captain Slate about Lazarus Wolfe’s deceiving the city with his support of David Fadi’s campaign, and he cautions Slate about pursuing Lazarus. Azrael and Iris have a long discussion and decide to kill Lazarus Wolfe as necessary, but not before finding out as much as they can. Azrael visits the Hangman in prison for information, gaining a valuable tip about a weapons dealer working for Lazarus named Ian Ross, and information about an informant of Lazarus’s in the prison. Azrael visits the man, who claims that Lazarus has vowed to kill Azrael himself, before he takes his own life with a cyanide capsule.

Part Two – “Capital Offense” – Azrael pays a visit to Ian Ross, an arms dealer for Lazarus Wolfe’s criminal underlings. Azrael psychologically manipulates Ross to discover Lazarus was paid off by Amour, the black-haired woman who orchestrated the Pharaoh heist. He and Iris surmise that Lazarus’s true intention is to prevent David Fadi from winning the mayoral election. They make an emergency trip to the prison, where they save the life of the Hangman from a group of Lazarus’s lackeys, at the cost of sending one of the young men into cardiac arrest. He and Iris use his scythes to revive him, and coerce one of the thugs to tell Lazarus that Azrael will meet him at a location on the docks.
When Lazarus arrives, Azrael reveals that he’s extorted all of Lazarus’s men and convinced David Fadi to reject Lazarus’s campaign donation, foiling his plan to stop Fadi. One of Lazarus’s men shoots him, and Lazarus promptly bleeds to death on the concrete, causing him to change form when he resurrects as an eight-foot monstrosity. Azrael and Iris fight the new Lazarus, but the fight is soon over when Lazarus severely hurts Iris and Azrael knocks him into the bay in fury. As the Valentine children stare at their now hospitalized mother, Azrael swears to Carolynn that he will make Lazarus regret what he did.

Part Three – “Solemn Vow” – Azrael and Carolynn practice sparring, and as Azrael continues to gain the upper hand, he uncovers the pain that Carolynn was hiding from him regarding Iris’s injuries. Azrael once again promises that Lazarus is going to suffer, and reassures Carolynn by telling her how proud he is of her strength and independence. He then meets with David Fadi, thanking him for being trusting enough to reject Lazarus’s donation, and the two gain a mutual respect for one another from their shared willingness to give anything for Bastion’s well-being. Finally, Azrael visits Iris in the hospital, and Iris asks whether he’s sure he can handle Lazarus. He asks if she loves him, claiming that that’s the only thing he needs. He seeks out Lazarus under the pier, and two fight a long, bloody, and vengeful battle, Azrael eventually pinning Lazarus down and beating him with no mercy. Lazarus’s heart stops, and Azrael swears that he lacks the mercy to let Lazarus die, reviving him with the electrical charges from his scythes. Lazarus is securely locked away, and Azrael brings Iris home from the hospital, promising that he can get through anything the city throws at him if he has her standing behind him.

Episode VI – Pandemic

Part One – “Site of Infection” – After a man collapses dead in the street, Captain Slate asks Azrael to investigate a mysterious sickness that’s taken the lives of several citizens over the past few weeks. Azrael investigates the victims, discovering each of them died of a similar disease causing dissolution of the lungs, jaundice, and dark red lesions. He and Iris use a series of unusual scars on the victims’ hips to discover a map of a location. They explore the street, finding nothing at first, until Azrael extends his consciousness to discover an inordinate amount of rats in the tunnels below the street. He explores the focal point of the creatures’ interest, discovering an underground research lab where someone had engineered the disease meticulously. A shadow of a man on a projector is the sickness’s creator, the Rat King, who is prepared to unleash a deadly gas that will kill the entire city in three days unless Azrael sacrifices his own life. Azrael decides to save the city, recording a message for his wife and daughters as he keys in the code that will ensure his death.

Part Two – “Synthesis” – The Rat King betrays his promise, unleashing the deadly disease over the city and telling them publicly of their impending deaths. Azrael lashes out at the Rat King before returning home, blaming himself for the tragedy and contemplating his next move, convinced that the situation is hopeless. Iris tells him that as long as he lives, there’s still hope, and the two go to the sewer lab where Azrael had been willing to sacrifice his own life to search for a cure. Here they discover the personal computer of one Arthur Nezumi, and after searching his personal laboratory, they discover Nezumi had worked on synthesizing cures before his last experiment, a project nicknamed “Elise” that had resulted in his becoming the Rat King. Their investigation is interrupted when the Rat King attacks them, halting both of them and escaping with his computer and personal notes. Returning home, Iris tells Azrael that a project of his called Toxicity was the only way to stop the Rat King, and as he asks Carolynn to help him finish the suit, she begins to violently cough up blood, demonstrating her having been infected by Rat King’s disease.

Part Three – “Patient Zero” – Azrael works tirelessly to finish the Toxicity armor, motivated by the city in the balance and his rage for what the Rat King had done to Carolynn. He enlists the help of David Fadi to administer the cure once he finds it, and marches on the Rat King’s hideout. The two furiously exchange blows, Azrael unaffected by the Rat King’s attacks thanks to the Toxicity suit. During the altercation Azrael lights Arthur’s jacket on fire, burning it away to reveal his jaundiced, lesion-marred skin. As Azrael beats the Rat King with a lead pipe, he is reminded of the dream he has about his father, pulling him back to notice the Rat King’s residual injuries. He determines Arthur’s status as patient zero, convincing him to surrender the cure. During the conversation, the Rat King reveals that he convinced to destroy the city by a black-haired woman, who he determines to be Amour. As Azrael begins to synthesize a cure, the Rat King stabs him through a gap in his armor, opening a wound to the infectious air around them. To protect himself from the gas, Azrael cauterizes his abdomen with a blowtorch before knocking the Rat King out. Azrael and David Fadi administer a citywide cure, and Azrael injects Carolynn with the vaccine. Azrael notices the connection between Amour and all the cases he’s recently worked on, determined to find her, lest she kill everyone in Bastion.

Episode VII – Weapon of Choice

Part One – “En Garde” – A few weeks after the Rat King’s attack, Azrael’s searches for Amour have proven mostly fruitless, he tracks down a lead to the apartment of a man who mysteriously disappeared, finding a name and the word “Aperture”. He interrogates the contact he found in the apartment, who tells him Aperture was an Albright Industries project. Before his interrogation is complete, his victim is shot from across the street by a mysterious woman in white armor. Azrael gives chase, and after an intense battle, the assassin leads Azrael to her master, a woman in a black coat who Azrael believes to be Amour. She refers to the woman in white as “Jewel”, and after the three fight, Azrael discovers this woman is not Amour. Upon asking her name, she refers to herself as the Cloak, and the woman in white the Dagger, before she activates a flashbang to escape. Jewel and Azrael trade a few more blows, and after Azrael breaks her arm, Jewel straightens it and shakes off the wound as though it never happened. Jewel retreats and Azrael narrowly escapes the building as an explosive charge detonates, blowing up the empty apartment.

Part Two – “Attaque de Fer” – Azrael decides to pursue the information on Albright Industries, leading him to Head of Technological Development Mark Davin. Azrael manipulates Davin’s fear to find visions of Aperture prototypes, seeing what looks like the same power armor Jewel was wearing. He discovers that Davin sold the plans for Aperture to Cloak and made it look like the plans were stolen, then subsequently cancelled the project. Using schematic information he found, Azrael discovers he can track Jewel through a communications relay in the armor, and plans a surprise attack to stop Cloak and Dagger. In the attack, Azrael apprehends Cloak and a briefcase she was carrying, and Iris attacks Jewel, believing she inadvertently killed her. Azrael then realizes his error, breaking off Jewel’s hand to confirm that Aperture isn’t a power suit design, but Jewel is actually a robot.

Part Three – “Coup De Grace” – Azrael investigates Jewel to learn more about the android’s functionality, learning her capability of a few thousand different move combinations in combat. He then goes to interrogate Cloak, discovering that she is working for a secret organization against her will under threat of harm to her husband. Azrael reveals that she’s been lied to, and her husband killed himself several years ago after her disappearance. Given this news, Cloak activates the black briefcase, a katana-wielding, upgraded version of the Aperture android. Azrael fights the new Cloak and Dagger, decapitating the robot. The robot’s body explodes as Azrael throws himself over Cloak to protect her, and after she reclaims the robot’s katana, she gives Azrael a ruby necklace given to her by her husband, making him promise that Iris will always know how much she means to him in the same her husband did to her. She gives him the ruby before stabbing herself through the heart with the katana. Azrael gives Iris the necklace just as Cloak asked, potentially closer now to finding Amour than he previously thought.
Amour is revealed as Vivian Malveuax, the daughter of Mallory Malveaux, the powerful leader of a secret agency called Couture. Vivian and her friend Scarlett Toussaint are up for Mallory’s soon vacant position, and Vivian discusses a plan to secure her place as leader with her friend Zoe Clarke, a mysterious agent who seems to have experience with Azrael.

Episode VIII – Cry Havoc

Part One – “Costly Blood” – Azrael follows a gangster investigating the recent murder of a powerful local criminal named Damien Marcus, and after a messy interrogation, he’s led to a taxi company Marcus was known to use as a front. He goes home to pick up some equipment, where he tells Iris that his next actions won’t be good. He arrives at the taxi company and aggressively eliminates all the guards before he breaks open the back office. He recognizes the man inside, a kidnapper who stole a young boy when he fought Azrael twelve years prior, who reveals six kidnapped girls locked in the closet in the garage. Azrael fights the man, breaking his spine and paralyzing him below the waist. Azrael then makes an example of him to get information from the guards, beating the man brutally with a lead pipe until he gets answers. At the end of the encounter, Azrael saves the girls, and the kidnapper is visited in the hospital later on by Zoe Clarke and Vivian Malveaux, where Vivian cryptically states that Azrael is acting exactly in accordance to plan.

Part Two – “Ruby Lips” – Azrael awakens caked in dried blood and searching for Marcus’s assassin. After a rough start, Iris inquires about the previous night’s events, and Azrael regretfully recounts the tale of the man he hospitalized and the girls he saved, and Iris tells him that even though his methods were rough, he did the right thing. He questions his motives, swearing that he’s going to stop Amour even though his rivalry is personal. He then leaves to search for the assassin as Iris and Carolynn speculate as to what made him the vengeful spirit he’s become. Azrael leaves for the Bastion Mall to hunt the assassin, a man he recognized from seeing him there before. Azrael observes the man in subtlety to determine suspicion before dragging him into a closed building and attempting to interrogate him. When he splits the assassin’s face open, revealing him to be an android, the robot flees as Azrael gives chase. In the process of the chase, Azrael falls from a roof, severely injuring himself and temporarily losing his eyesight. He is guided to his mother’s flower shop by a kindly woman named Jenny, and once he arrives, he enlists the help of Raziel to heal his injuries. The two have a discussion questioning whether or not Azrael is willing to start a war considering his personal attachments to it. At the end of their discussion, Azrael promises that he’ll do whatever it takes to protect Bastion from her.

Part Three – “A Monarch’s Voice” – Zoe Clarke accompanies Vivian to visit the grave of a man named Caesar J. R. Ackerman as Azrael tracks the signal of the android he’s been following. Iris asks Azrael why he’s so afraid of what will happen if he stops Amour, where Azrael discusses the hero he and his mother needed when they lived in the crime-ridden Bastion when he was a child, and whether he can be that hero if he stops Amour for personal reasons. Iris reassures him before he leaves while Vivian is confronted at the cemetery by a Couture agent who believes she has ill intent for Mallory. After a misplaced word about Caesar, Vivian lashes out in defense of her father’s honor, savagely beating Agent Simon to defend her father and her plans for Mallory. She returns to Zoe’s side to request the presence of one of Lazarus’s associate and a change of clothes before she leaves.

Azrael locates the robot, discovering a computer programmer at a warehouse coding the machine. He’s led into the next room before a woman with a black motorcycle helmet arrives. She reveals her identity as Vivian J Malveaux and reveals her dream for inspiring fear in the criminals of the city and trying to make it a better place. The two battle, trading hard blows until a break in the action when Vivian reveals that she was the woman Azrael saved from the Hangman when the Gallows fell. After Azrael threatens to detonate the android production facility, Vivian calls the fight a truce, claiming the city will fall if she dies. Azrael recovers what information he can before destroying the factory, returning home to recover. Meanwhile, Vivian meditates and treats her wounds, discussing her “big plans” for Valentine’s Day the following weekend.

Episode IX – Brothers In Arms

Part One – “The Black Herald” – Azrael awakens from a terrifying dream about losing a battle to Vivian Malveaux for her to reveal his sigil on her chest. Later, he finds concern regarding the missing computer programmer from Vivian’s android construction facility a few days prior, when his search is interrupted by the arrival of two brothers: Raphael, the enormous, strong and silent monster hunter, and his snarky and vain brother Uriel. The two come to Bastion bringing the news of a terrible threat, a creature they tracked to Bastion after it escaped their containment facility called a Turrak, a destructive beast that produces a significant threat to Azrael’s city. Azrael and the two brothers’ search for the beast leads them to the forest, where they discover Ashur, a monster hunter and part of the Calestaan, an ancient and dangerous group of people who hunted and trained monsters to do their bidding. After a brief duel, Ashur takes the Turrak into the forest, where the three Archangels give chase.

Meanwhile, Vivian Malveaux and Zoe Clarke meet with a mysterious man to discuss their plans, and Vivian gives her friend Scarlett a call, claiming she hadn’t heard anything from Mallory and telling Scarlett she shouldn’t worry about it.

Part Two – “The Red Day” – Azrael and the brothers chase the Turrak into the forest, where the three work together using Raphael and Uriel’s fire abilities to bring down Ashur and the Turrak. Azrael and Raphael discuss their differences and Azrael’s lone wolf style. After the two brothers leave, Azrael presents Iris with a Valentine’s Day gift before leaving to find Vivian’s programmer. Meanwhile, Vivian Malveaux takes Mallory out for the evening, where she finally reveals her true feelings about her mother, surrendering her to the mercenaries she hired, telling Zoe to move to the next phase of the plan, and stealing the power of Couture’s leadership for herself. Azrael calls the police to turn in the programmer he captured, only to watch them execute him without second thought, their leader demanding that they bring him Azrael at all costs.

Episode X – City on Fire

Part One – “Infiltration” – Azrael contacts Captain Slate to confirm that the officers who executed the programmer aren’t real cops before subsequently taking them all out. He battles the mercenary who led them, a technologically-augmented ex-marine mercenary hired by Vivian Malveaux. Azrael tries to disassemble the exoskeleton in the fight, but he’s badly injured and escapes Manacle after backup arrives. Iris patches him up, and Azrael turns to his friends for help taking Manacle out. He first reaches out to Captain Slate to work with the police department, following up with David Fadi to find military-grade countermeasure tech.

Finally, he reaches out to the finest warrior he knows, the General of the army of the Lord.

Part Two – “Fire Superiority” – Azrael and Michael move on Manacle’s forces, pushing back as they take down watchtowers and troop strongholds to take back the city. Meanwhile, Vivian Malveaux brings Couture into a frenzy over Mallory’s “mysterious” disappearance, and puts Azrael in their crosshairs, securing her new leadership of the company and pointing a loaded weapon at the Angel of Death. Michael and Azrael attack one of Manacle’s bases to find information on his troop placements and his base of operations at an uptown hotel, and they hatch a plan to stop the mercenary once and for all.

Part Three – “Shock and Awe” – Azrael and Michael mount an assault on the hotel, cutting the power and working their way up through the floors, devastating Manacle’s forces along the way. Upon viewing the events through the security cameras, Vivian chastises Manacle for not being there to stop Azrael, and after he leaves, Vivian gives up on him and tells Zoe to start the backup plan.

Manacle meets Azrael on the hotel roof and locks the two in the electrical field, Azrael using Manacle’s communications control center to broadcast the fight to all of Manacle’s forces, throwing the first half of the fight before coming back to tear Manacle to pieces, dismantling his power suit and shredding his muscles before holding a broken mercenary up to Manacle’s soldiers, threatening that there is nowhere he won’t find them.

Flash forward to a few days later where Vivian visits Manacle in the hospital, torturing him and chastising him for his failure to beat Azrael.
Azrael and Michael return to Azrael’s house after the fight to find Manacle’s forces fleeing the city, stricken with fear at the sight of their fallen leader. Azrael goes home to find his house ransacked, Iris kidnapped with the only evidence at the house being a capital Z carved into the wall.

Episode XI – The Mark of Zarra

Part One – “Black Water” – Azrael comes home to find a large Z carved into his wall, his wife nowhere to be found. He calls Carolynn and demands that she and the girls stay at Ava’s house until he says otherwise before tearing out of the house in fury, claiming he knows exactly where to find who did this.

A storm begins as Azrael finds himself at a local shipping port, confronting a woman in a long black coat with a sharp silver sword. The two battle furiously as the storm rages on, a match in sheer intensity of power and skill. The fight ends when Azrael is shot by the expert markswoman before she leaves the scene, telling him he’ll know where to find her next.

Azrael returns home to patch up his wounds where he is confronted by Carolynn, who demands answers. He says that the woman in black is Zarra, a dangerous and highly trained agent of Vivian Malveaux’s who kidnapped Iris, and reveals that Zarra learned everything she knows from him.

Part Two – “Silver Pieces” – Azrael recounts the memory of the day he met Zarra, a young vigilante on the hunt for a dangerous Mexican gang with a vengeful spirit and a complex array of skills. Azrael had decided that he could mentor her in the hopes of making her a better hero, so the two formed a fragile alliance that would later become a partnership.

In the present, Azrael visits a train station where he and Zarra shared a significant memory from their past together, where he now confronts Zarra in the hopes of learning a kidnapped Iris’s location. Zarra tries to discourage Azrael, recalling his weaknesses and pointing out a perceived hypocrisy in Azrael’s actions. Azrael exploits a weakness he remembered from their past together, getting the best of Zarra and forcing her to tell him where Iris is. She agrees to give him the location if Azrael will fight her one last time the following night, and he begrudgingly accepts.

At the end of the night, Azrael carries a bent but unbroken Iris home, where he promises that he’ll do the right thing with Zarra, whatever that may be.

Part Three – “Crimson Steel” – Vivian Malveaux and Scarlett Toussaint reminisce about their memories together and Vivian’s newfound leadership of Couture, while Azrael comes to Zarra’s apartment in the hopes that he can appeal to her better nature.

After a bloody and violent confrontation, the two find a way to settle their differences, and Zoe considers whether or not she’s lost her way. She ultimately decides to leave Bastion with an unknown heading to try and find her way to good again. Azrael bids her farewell, then returns home.

Vivian goes to Zoe’s destroyed apartment, quickly becoming aware of her abrupt departure and mourning the loss of one of her best friends. Scarlett tries to comfort her as Vivian swears to take revenge on Azrael, claiming that she’ll kill him personally.

Episode XII – Necessary Evil

Part One – “Caesar Now Be Still” – Azrael leads an assault on the dress shop, infiltrating a file room and encountering a locked door before being ambushed by Scarlett. Boasting a red ball gown and a high-tech pairs of white gloves providing her impenetrable defenses and incredible attack speeds. After she severely injures Azrael, he manages to escape and she reports his break-in to Vivian. Vivian posts guards at the dress shop as Azrael and Iris lead a second attack. Azrael tears into the locked room with a chain, recovering all the information he can from the computer inside. He leaves through the main floor of the dress shop, surprised by the presence of Vivian Malveaux.

Part Two – “Half So Good a Will” – Vivian and Azrael sit down to discuss their histories and Paris and Vivian’s views on Azrael’s lack of a place in the successful world order. Azrael claims that the world order can’t be allowed to destroy people’s lives without someone standing up to fight, and Vivian expresses how easy it is to kill Azrael, revealing his sacrifice to stop the Rat King’s bomb was orchestrated by Vivian. Here the two begin their duel, doing massive damage to each other before Scarlett and Iris join the fray. Azrael and Iris detonate a superheated explosive sword in Scarlett’s hand, blowing her armored gloves apart and severely injuring her, distracting Vivian to make their escape.

Azrael is discouraged, wondering about whether or not he’s the hero Bastion needs. Iris convinces him that he doesn’t need to be a legend, he just needs to be a man.

Scarlett discovers that Vivian orchestrated the Rat King’s uprising, ruining her career and stealing the power of Couture’s chair from her. Scarlett surrenders her Couture-issue gun to Vivian, walking away from the organization forever and ending what was once their most treasured friendship.

Scarlett gives Azrael the damaged gloves, saying that she doesn’t care who wins the fight between him and Vivian anymore. Azrael tells her not to forget who she is before she leaves Bastion.

Finally, Vivian launches her mysterious operation, and Azrael calls to assemble his forces and finish the fight for good.

Episode XIII – Hell Hath No Fury

Part One – “Veni” – Michael leads the operation as Azrael and the Archangels infiltrate Imperial Tower, Couture’s secondary base of operations. Azrael and Raziel enter through the basement, gaining control of the elevators and electrical systems for the building before clearing upwards. After Gabriel clears the first floor, the three meet Archangels Raphael, Uriel, and Iris on the upper floors, sending each of them to patrol the building and find what they can.

Azrael confronts Vivian in a conference room on the top floor, where the two share a brief discussion on the circumstances that brought them both to want better for Bastion, and Vivian says that Bastion is finally ready to change.

She and Azrael begin a brief battle where Azrael reveals his suit’s new steel claws. Vivian reveals two of the new, fully-upgraded Jewel robots, who promptly attack Azrael before Michael enters the fight. Vivian escapes to a helicopter through a nearby window, and Azrael and Michael look through a window to the South End, where they behold an army of Jewel robots waiting to attack.

Part Two – “Vidi” – Michael desperately plans a defense strategy to protect Bastion, and Azrael uses an android’s communications unit to locate the central point of their instructions’ broadcast. He follows the signal to the Gothic Federated building, where he confronts Vivian about her plans for the robot army. She discusses the nature of the computer, a network that scans social media and wireless communication to determine mark criminals who have avoided the law, to be slaughtered by the androids.

She sics a large group of the robots on Azrael, who hold him back as one of the rallies a sword on him, stabbing him in the stomach.

Part Three – “Vici” – Azrael pushes back the androids, rallying past the shallow stab wound as he ruins the android army, throwing Vivian Malveaux through the window before disabling the bomb mechanisms in the machines and blowing up the navigations computer. He gives chase to Vivian, meeting her on the roof of the nearby Trinity Church, where she’s set up a field computer and a detonator that will blow up every remaining Jewel android.

Vivian tells Azrael the sacrifices she’s made and the plans she has to create a better Bastion where criminals fear to fight the law, and the two engage in a battle more fierce than ever before. Vivian severely injures Azrael, seemingly cutting his throat before stepping to the edge of the building and pressing the trigger.

Azrael reveals that he switched out the detonator for an android power battery he took earlier in the fight, and destroys the detonator with Vivian’s pistol, ending the fight for good.

The two sit down and discuss their differences and visions for Bastion, determining that they might have more in common than previously thought. They share a few moments discussing heroism before Captain Aaron Slate arrives, taking Vivian to jail and sharing one brief, wordless moment of solidarity with Azrael.

The Archangels return to Azrael’s home, finally revealed to the public in the face of a world that had changed in a mere instant. Iris and Azrael ponder how they’ll react to this development, ready to accept the strange new world they face.

Months later, Azrael meets with a jailed Vivian Malveaux, discussing a mysterious file and his strange new international connections, and as Azrael leaves, he considers their continued contact and whether he trusts her despite the strange attraction they share, as well as his curiosity about the fact that he can’t sense Vivian’s spiritual energy like he can other living things.